


Hold Together

by Try2CatchMe



Series: Sanctuary 'verse [10]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Gen, M/M, Pre-Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-07
Updated: 2012-12-07
Packaged: 2017-11-20 12:50:28
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,600
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/585608
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Try2CatchMe/pseuds/Try2CatchMe
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Adam was fairly sure that, if he didn't feel like he was dying (again, third time's the charm!), this would be one of the most embarrassing moments of his life."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hold Together

**Author's Note:**

> This chapter was supposed to be just the first half of one, but it got really long, so I decided to just go ahead and post it so you guys didn't have to suffer with the cliffhanger anymore.

_There was pain and torment and an infinity stretching out behind and before and Earth and humanity was nothing more than a fond memory._

_Sam was gone and Lucifer was furious._

_Adam was trapped and there were times Michael couldn't protected him and still times Michael was just as bad as his brother._

_And more than the pain was the_ despair _, the knowledge that_ this was it _, he wasn't getting out, he could never get-_

"Adam!"

_Someone was pinning him down and even after all this time, he fought. He knew it wouldn't do anything, had learned that very painful lesson time and again, but he couldn't stop, he couldn-_

"Adam, you're here, you're safe. _Listen to me_."

_There was a shock to his arm and his waist, like a jolt of electricity and a flood of warmth, but not the burning heat of the cage. The kind of warmth under seven blankets in the middle of winter where you never want to move again-_

"Breathe, Adam, you have to _breathe!_ "

 _A hand landed against his chest and_ pushed.

Adam's eyes flew open as the air was forced out of him. He was instantly panicking, sucking down air and throwing his arms out to find something to hold onto, he felt like he was drowning. But the hand on his chest and another on his arm held him down  and he was trapped-

" _Adam_."

Samandriel. It was Samandriel.

It was okay if it was Samandriel holding Adam down because he knew Samandriel would _let him up_.

He slumped against the floor, closing his eyes, breathing heavily, and feeling his heart jackrabbit in his chest. It hurt, hurt like he'd been running too hard and breathing too shallowly and drowning all at once. He felt like he'd been dragged through the Grand Canyon by the hair. Repeatedly. At length.

The hand left his chest and ended up half on his face, half on his neck, like it's owner couldn't decide if he needed to get Adam's attention or check his pulse, "Are you back?"

He opened his eyes again and, when they focused, saw Samandriel hovering over him, blue grey eyes intense and worried. He managed a nod before closing his eyes and tilting his head back as far as it would go, gulping down air. God, everything hurt. He was pretty sure he was actually receiving pain signals from his fingernails and they didn't have nerves. He just wanted to go to bed and stay there, possibly for the rest of time, but he didn't think he could roll onto his stomach, let alone stand.

Fortunately, he didn't have to. Apparently, Samandriel took Adam's nod as the go ahead to do whatever the hell he wanted, which was, in this case, to scoop Adam up off the floor like he weighed all of ten pounds.

Adam was fairly sure that, if he didn't feel like he was dying (again, third time's the charm!), this would be one of the most embarrassing moments of his life.

As it was, all he could managed was a strangled little hissing sound as he let his head fall against Samandriel's shoulder because screw his dignity, he was in pain and exhausted and didn't want to hold his head up anymore.

"Is he going to be alright?" Adam really wished Sam would fuck off and let him die in peace. Dean too. They'd done it twice before, it shouldn't be too hard.

Samandriel must have done some nonverbal communication at Sam, either that or Adam drifted off there for a minute because the next thing he knew he was on his bed and the angel was tugging off his shoes and being quietly bewildered by the laces.

It was a sight that sort of made the deep, yawning pit that had opened in Adam's chest seem slightly less endless.

Well, it did right up until Samandriel stood and made for the door.

Adam didn't know where he found the strength to lunge and catch at Samandriel's sleeve, but he managed it.

"Don't-"

He couldn't get out anything beyond that because just forcing the one word from his dry throat was agony and he was cut off by a hacking, choking cough. It felt like he'd been screaming forever and was now paying for it.

God, had he been screaming?

Samandriel pressed a water bottle into his hands, because Samandriel was actually an angel in every sense of the word, and Adam downed half of it in one go. Afterwards, continuing to be upright was really no longer a viable option, but he didn't want Samandriel to go either and he had no idea why.

The angel pushed him back against the pillows, "I'm not leaving, I'm just going to go speak to your brothers. I will return shortly." He pressed the back of his hand against the side of Adam's head, "Rest."

And he did.

His sleep was a mess of greys and blues and the deep, pervasive feeling of being hopelessly, horrendously lost.

When he eventually did wake, his room was a muted color, like it was cloudy outside and the sunlight couldn't quite reach. It took him a moment to remember that it was always like that when he had the curtains closed. The curtains had been made for him by his high school girlfriend after he kept complaining about the sun waking him up first thing in the morning. They were ugly as sin but they did a damn good job of keeping the light out, so he never took them down.

Neck deep in these memories, he automatically pressed into the touch of a hand moving through his hair. And it felt ridiculously good in contrast to the bone deep ache in the rest of his body, so he didn't bother moving away when he realized he had his head in Samandriel's lap.

One of these days, he was going to have to take a good, long look at his life.

"How are you feeling?" It was a good thing Samandriel's voice was naturally soft because Adam's head was already killing him.

"I feel like I just got hit by a bus. Filled with angry linebackers." He also sounded like he spent the night gargling gravel. Awesome. "What the actual hell happened?"

Samandriel sighed, "The only reason you can function right now is because you can't remember Hell."

"Yeah, you said Michael blocked the memories."

"While that was broadly true, he didn't do a very good job."

"I'm shocked."

"As I understand it, Michael separated a piece of his Grace from himself and gave it to you. That piece is constantly battling the memories of Hell inside your mind. Think of it like..." There was a pause while Samandriel presumably ran several analogies past Alfie before coming up with one that made sense, "... like the memories of Hell are pent up pressure and Michael's Grace contains them. Sometimes, usually when something reminds you of the Cage, that pressure leaks out. When that happens, Michael's Grace can fight the majority of the memories back because the pressure is released, but the memories that have escaped are beyond its reach."

Adam took a second to digest this information, "So how come I didn't have a fit every time I remembered something? I don't know if you could tell, but I'm not exactly doing such a great job of repressing it on my own."

The angel sighed again, "It's because I left. When I pulled you from Hell, my Grace left a mark on your body and soul. Our proximity since has allowed my Grace to fight off the memories that Michael's could not. My leaving to speak to my brother left you open to be overwhelmed."

Huh. Okay, that made a lot more sense. His inexplicably strong desire to be around Samandriel was because... of angel mojo. Awesome, he wasn't actually going insane or completely giving up his dignity, there was a reason for it.

That was awesome.

Really.

He had no idea if he was being sarcastic or not, _that_ 's how screwed in the head he currently was.

Samandriel had apparently taken his silence as a bad sign, "I apologize, I did not know. I never would have left if I had."

Okay, _that_ he was happy about. Samandriel had a reason to stick around now. That was good, angelically-enforced connection or no.

"It's fine, man, I know." Adam said, closing his eyes again and trying to come up with something else to talk about so he wouldn't have to get up that simultaneously was not _this_ , "What about Dean and Sam and Cas, what happened with them?"

"I spoke with my brother on several important matters and informed yours that they would have to leave until they could control their hostility."

Adam's eyes flew open, "Dude, you _kicked them out_?"

Samandriel frowned in thought, "Alfie says that is the correct phrase for it, yes. He also says that it was 'badass'."

Laughing, Adam levered himself up into a sitting position so he could hold up a hand. Samandriel stared blankly at it for a few seconds before Alfie seemed to take over to complete the high five. Samandriel glared at his hand afterward in confusion.

"What was that?"

"That," Adam said, getting up to grab clothes and a towel because he was gross and had slept in his clothes and needed a shower _yesterday_ , "was a high five. It's a gesture humans use to celebrate victory or an abundance of awesome. Or badassery."

"Oh."

Samandriel looked oddly pleased at that.


End file.
